English as an international language in Asia: Implications for language education

Abstract

Even as Anglophone power wanes in Asia, and China and India rise, the role of the English language in the region continues to develop. How are students in Asian nations such as Vietnam, Malaysia and China itself being taught English? This much-needed overview analyzes the differing language education policies of selected countries that also include Indonesia, Japan and Sri Lanka. Noting ASEAN’s adoption of English as its sole working language, it traces the influence of globalization on English language education in Asia: in many systems, it pushes local languages off the curriculum and is taught as a second language after the national one